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Age of Youth K-Drama Review

Wednesday, 9 November 2016

Medical dramas are not my thing by a long shot, but if you put Yoo Yun Suk and Seo Hyun Jin in a room together, there's no way I'm not going to tune in for at least an episode or two to see the sparks fly. Enter Romantic Doctor, Teacher Kim (shortened to the only slightly less ridiculous Doctor Romantic on the international version). How's it faring so far?

What it's about: There are two talented surgeons (Yoo Yun Suk and Seo Hyun Jin) who both have tragic pasts and both end up in a tiny hospital in the boondocks with another talented, but very weird surgeon (Han Suk Kyu), who, I assume, will mentor them all out of their emotional wounds.

Episodes watched: 2

First impressions:

Episode 1: "WHAT did I just watch?"

No, seriously. It's like they crammed the plot of an entire series into one episode. Within the premiere, we got to see all of the following things (Do you need a spoiler alert if it's all within the first hour?):

A traumatic childhood
Several people's lives saved in the most dramatic ways possible
Approximately 273 gallons of spurting fake blood
Spurting fake butt juice (ewwwwwww)
A (very steamy, but also semi-problematic) kiss
A love confession
A proposition of sex
A proposal of marriage (not all from the same person)
A cheating lover
A massive accident
A dead main character
Another dead main character!
A disastrous jaunt in the woods
A mysterious mountain man

Phew! Yeah, the first episode wasn't even messy; it was just plain insane. All of these dramatic things kept happening every 30 seconds, but there was no time for the emotional beats to land. If they had split it over at least 2 episodes like most shows do, it probably would have worked better.

Hoooo boy, they sure don't waste any time, do they?

The there's episode 2, where the pace makes a lot more sense and we finally get to meet all of the characters, but I'm still not really sure what to expect from the weird mishmash of tones.

That being said, I loveloveloveloveloved Seo Hyun Jin's character, Yoon Seo Jung, especially in episode 1. She's smart, fun, charming, confident, and a badass at her job. I was sad to see her so tame in episode 2, but I'm hoping it's just a matter of time before she gets back on her feet as her former fiery self.

Even though I didn't like the forced beginning of the kiss, I also see a lot of potential for solid chemistry between our two leads. They both do romance very well, and Yoo Yun Suk, like Seo Hyun Jin, is immensely charming when given the chance. Toss in Han Suk Kyu, who you know will be interesting, and it's a pretty irresistible combo, regardless of the wacky writing. With lead actors like these who are all so charismatic, it's hard not to want to give the show the best shot possible.

Do I know what to expect? No. Will I keep watching just for the acting and the promise of better kisses down the line? You'd better believe it.

Where to watch Doctor Romantic:

New K-drama Alert: Doctor Romantic/ Romantic Doctor, Teacher Kim Review

Saturday, 5 November 2016

It's no secret that Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo and Moonlight Drawn by Clouds were pitted against each other, even if indirectly. Two fusion sageuks with pretty, fresh-faced cast members airing in the same time slot were bound to draw some comparisons, even if the shows ended up being drastically different. So was a sweet cross-dressing romance enough to beat out a multitude of flower boys? Let's discuss!

Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo Review

This drama. SO MANY FEELINGS. Where do I even begin?

The Really, Really Good Stuff

Scarlet Heart (as I'm going to refer to it from here on out) captured me from the beginning. Even though there were weird production flaws, this show was more engaging than any simulcast I've seen in a long, long time. I found myself invested in the fate of the characters (at least the central triangle), and I really couldn't predict where the show was heading, something that doesn't happen often after this many years of drama watching.

What really captivated me was that the stakes felt real. Even though it was a fusion historical, the series never shied away from the bloody, dark aspects of life in Goryeo. There weren't easy answers to every conflict in the show, and characters had to make legitimately awful decisions without any K-drama magic to sweep away the consequences. Sometimes that meant that I absolutely couldn't root for the female lead to choose either male lead, but it also meant that the characters felt multilayered, interesting, and—most importantly—unpredictable.

Gahhhh everything about this episode was perfection.

I particularly love how the drama handled (Spoilers ahead!) Wook's transformation. I completely understand why Soo would fall for the sweet, gentle scholar who teaches her how to read instead of the hotheaded serial killer, and for many episodes, I had no idea how they could ever make her stop loving him. Then episode 11 happened, and I understood. Suddenly, you see how he's had a pattern of indecision throughout their entire relationship, even in the good times. You remember all those times he caved to the pressure of family loyalty, even back in the beginning. Maybe he turned totally evil a little too fast, but just as much as I understood why Soo loved him in the first place, I also understood why they eventually broke up.

The narrative conflict also set up my other favorite aspect of the show: the men couldn't save the damsel in distress. In pretty much every other K-drama in the history of K-dramas, the male leads will swoop in at the last minute to save the lady fair, but that didn't happen here. On not one, but two occasions, the male leads stood by helplessly as Hae Soo faced death, and in both cases, Hae Soo was saved by women willing to make sacrifices that the men wouldn't. For a majority of the series, the writing really respected its female characters and filled the palace with clever, powerful women who were both heroes and villains.

As a final plus to the show, we have Lee Joon Ki, who absolutely slayed in every scene, as did his early-episode hair. Yeah, let's just all remember his glorious mane before they decided to time jump and crimp his bangs...

The Really, Really Not-So-Good Stuff

Aside from Lee Joon Ki's run-in with the crimping iron, there were plenty of problems with this show, which even I'm willing to admit. The last handful of episodes were kind of a hot mess, so I'll just list some of the issues for you:

The musical choices. It's like they just spun a wheel covered in song names to choose which one they assigned to each scene.

As much as I really appreciated the individual characters, I never understood why the lead couple was together. When did she fall in love with him? Why did she fall in love with him? For a woman who cared about her freedom of choice so much that she would slit her wrists rather than be forced into marriage, it makes zero sense that she would fall for the guy who for years keeps talking about how he will never let her go. Aside from the amazing rainfall scene I screenshot above, it was hard to care much about their star-crossed love.

Speaking of which, Soo literally has the worst taste in men. Really, you're going to waste your time painting that guy's face on a bunch of rocks when you have sweet, supportive, handsome Jung by your side? Really?

I'm just gonna pretend she said "Oh yeah, I'll totally remember you and BTW I definitely love you and not my crazy ex!"
Make better life choices, Soo.

Baek Ah and his girlfriend. What? Why? What?

Did no one clean out the mercury-filled bathtub after the king died? Because that's the only reason I can think of why every single king started crazy laughing right after taking over the throne. Remember how I said that Wook's transformation made sense? Yeah, So's not so much. How did we go from "I want to be king so people don't have to die" to "Kill them ALLLLLL" so fast?

Where did Wook go for the second half of the series? Did they blow their Kang Ha Neul budget in the first few episodes? I know some people complained that he got too much screen time at first, but I would watch Wook forever and always on my screen.

Everything about Soo's time travel. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The show devolved into Nonsenseville, so it was really hard to care about anything anyone did at the end of the show. It's a pity because so much of the drama had so much potential.

Moonlight Drawn By Clouds Review

Let me just get this out of the way: You're not going to like my review.

The Good Stuff

On paper, Moonlight Drawn by Clouds is a far superior drama to Scarlet Heart. The writing is smooth. The production is clean. The music makes sense. The leads are both talented actors who also happen to be so adorable that you just smile when you see them on screen.

Because the leads (and particularly Park Bo Gum, who got the more entertaining role of the pair) are so likable, it's easy to root for the romance, and the writers knew it. There's no shortage of squee-worthy moments sprinkled throughout this very, very pretty series.

The Not-So-Good Stuff (Don't Hate Me for Being Honest!)

Given the general adoration this show got (especially in comparison to Scarlet Heart), I know this isn't going to be a popular opinion, but I couldn't actually finish this drama.

Maybe this is a case of "It's not you; it's me." I fully recognize that the production was good and the acting was wonderful, but I watched a full six episodes and just completely lost the will to keep going. At first, I felt like I must be the only one who felt this way, but then I saw that Amanda from Outside Seoul had written two posts articulating pretty much exactly what kept me from feeling engaged. (But seriously, is she a mind reader? Because I had been composing thoughts in my head and she basically said them word for word).

What it comes down to is that Moonlight Drawn by Clouds suffered by comparison to two other shows: Sungkyungkwan Scandal and Scarlet Heart. Sungkyungkwan Scandal is one of my all-time favorite dramas, so when I saw Moonlight Drawn by Clouds with the exact same group setup, it was hard not to see the second and third male leads as a poor man's Song Joong Ki and Yoo Ah In (though Park Bo Gum's character was leaps and bounds more charming than Yoochun's snooty scholar).

I also found the female lead in Moonlight far less compelling. Kim Yoo Jin is a talented young actress, but I felt like her character had very little development (at least in the episodes I saw) in comparison to the lead in SKKS. She was just cheerful and ran around the palace. We knew so little of her dreams or ambitions that it was hard to connect. Maybe if I loved SKKS a little less. I wouldn't have cared, but every episode just made me wonder why I wasn't marathoning the best parts of SKKS instead.

When it comes to the Scarlet Heart comparison, I get that Moonlight, even in the early episodes, has better production value. That being said, it's so clean, cute, and sanitized that I found myself far more eager to immerse myself in the gritty, complicated world of Scarlet Heart. What made me drop Moonlight was watching a scene where the prince supposedly has to give up the female lead to protect the country, but then—SURPRISE!—we find out that he actually had a plan to save her all along! I made the mistake of watching that episode right after Court Lady Oh's magnificent episode on Scarlet Heart, where there was no such thing as getting out without losing something, and suddenly all of the neat little resolutions in Moonlight lost my interest.

Feel sad for me! JK no worries!

The Final Verdict

Moonlight was probably a better-executed show overall and Scarlet Heart ran off the rails at the end, but when Scarlet Heart was good, it was so very, very good.

What did you think of these two? Did I get it totally wrong? Convince me!

I'm sad how it all turned out too, Lee Joon Ki.

Where to Watch Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo

Where to Watch Moonlight Drawn by Clouds

Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo vs. Moonlight Drawn by Clouds Kdrama Review

Sunday, 14 August 2016

Image source

Cinderella and Four Knights premiered this week, and it's exactly what it promises to be: a completely cheesy throwback fairytale in the style of old-school K-dramas like Boys over Flowers or Goong. But does it work? Yes and no.

What it's about: Eun Ha Won (Park So Dam) is a hardworking young woman who lives with her selfish and unkind stepmother and stepsister. She ends up getting mixed up with three absurdly wealthy cousins (Jung Il Woo, Ahn Jae Hyun, and Lee Jung Shin) and their grandpas' stoic bodyguard (Choi Min) all of whom will most likely fall for her.

Episodes watched: 2

Thoughts so far: I know that I often complain about reusing old, cliche plots and characters over and over in dramas, but this show is just so unabashedly cliche that it kind of works. It's not trying to be new. It's not trying to be creative. I mean, even the music felt like it came straight out of Boys over Flowers!

Honestly, the first episode was kind of a hot mess with abrupt edits and weird tone. (And the hair—if every cast member is going to have matching haircuts, why, WHY must they be messy mushroom cuts?!?!) By the second episode, though, it fell into a more comfortable rhythm and found its footing a bit more. Somehow, even though I cringed at the wooden characters and completely obvious plot, I found myself enjoying that second episode way more than I should.

Is this going to be a good show? No. But it's so unashamed about what kind of story it is that it manages to feel nostalgic rather than stale. In some ways, this drama feels more reminiscent of a Disney Channel Original Movie than a modern K-drama. It's cotton candy fluff that embraces the fairytale setup in very literal terms (like her sleeping in a closet or dropping her fancy heel for one of the "knights" to find), and it plays up the feeling of familiarity at every turn. It's silly, but it's comfortable, and sometimes comfort cotton candy is exactly what you need.

It doesn't hurt that the cast is immensely likable. I can totally see why Park So Dam is everywhere in Korea these days, and even wooden Ahn Jae Hyun seems perfectly at home in this drama with just the right level of cheese to sell his lines.

One other thing I will say for the show is that, cliche as it is, the few tweaks it does make work particularly well. There have been a couple of instances where the male lead tried to intimidate or humiliate the female lead. Instead of showing her crushed spirits or deer-in-headlights timidity like you would in other dramas, the show waits just long enough for the moment to sink in before flipping it. I almost cheered when Jung Il Woo's character tried to embarrass Park So Dam's character, and she ended up smacking him in the head and calling him on his nonsense. It makes me think that maybe there's just enough self-awareness in the script to make it work.

Moral of the story? If you go into this wanting a lot of character development and depth, don't bother. But if you're looking for a fun throwaway watch that you might be slightly ashamed to admit that you enjoyed, we can shame watch it together!

Where to watch Cinderella and Four Knights:

New Drama Alert: Cinderella and Four Knights Korean Drama Review

Friday, 15 July 2016

Sometimes, I just wish shows would be aggressively bad because when my feelings are split, the disappointment sucks out all of my reviewing energy. If everything is terrible, rage fuels my fingers!

There's no rage this time around—just sheer disappointment. As a result, these reviews will be short. There were things that I really, really liked about both Another Oh Hae Young (a.k.a Oh Hae Young Again) and Lucky Romance. There were also things that I really didn't like.

Another Oh Hae Young/ Oh Hae Young Again review

Sigh. I honestly just stared dejectedly at my computer for 5 minutes, trying to will myself to review this show. Oh Hae Young was my spirit animal. Thanks to a stellar performance from Seo Hyun Jin, she felt more real than any other drama heroine I had seen in a long time, and even though she was incredibly flawed, I was so invested in her development as a character that I didn't even care that her counterpart, Eric, just stared at the camera blankly episode after episode.

In fact, I loved this show so fiercely and was so determined that it was going to be one of my all-time favorite shows no matter what that every episode, I kept defending it to myself. "Oh no," I said. "the drama extension isn't ruining things too much." That was a lie.

Because of my self-delusion and the fact that there were things I genuinely enjoyed about even the slowest episode, it took me a few days to really nail down what went wrong. Here it is: This show started out with Oh Hae Young defining all of her self worth in relation to other people: her fiance, "pretty" Hae Young, etc. It's a familiar and relatable struggle, and the show promised to show us how she grew to love herself for herself, regardless of what anyone else thought of her.

Unfortunately, when we get to the end of the show, we have no evidence that Hae Young knows how to love herself or be happy without validation from other people. Instead, she ends right where she began—happy, but happy because she's in the arms of a man who pays attention to her. I feel so cheated! Similarly, I loved the balance of their relationship at first, but by the end, I kind of forgot why they were even together in the first place.

Other observations I'm too lazy to actually discuss in detail:

Hae Young singing karaoke with her parents might be the best family scene in any K-drama, ever. Kim Mi Kyung is a goddess and I love her in everything.
Hey, whaddya know? Women feel sexual attraction too! Thanks for the reminder, show!
Can we all agree that Do Kyung's visions were a very random plot device? Yes? Good.
Jeon Hye Bin's "pretty Hae Young" was one classy second female lead. I'm glad she didn't turn to murder.
Han Tae Jin was a nonsense second male lead. Why was Hae Young engaged to him in the first place? It's a mystery.

Where to watch Another Oh Hae Young:

Lucky Romance review

Confession: I stopped at episode 10 of this show, so I guess you don't actually have to take my word on anything.

In my defense, though, I wanted to stop at episode 4, but I convinced myself to give it a shot for a while longer, so I think I deserve some effort points for that or something. I watched SIX MORE HOURS just so I could review this thing!

So here's the thing about this show: Starting around episode 5, when Ryu Joon Yul was given actual things to do with his character, he was absolutely slaying it. If this show had been nothing but Soo Ho doing his doofy awkward shuffle, I would have kept watching until the end of time.

At some point, though, I had to admit that only liking or connecting with one character wasn't enough incentive to keep watching. When an episode ended with a kiss scene and I felt absolutely no interest in starting the next episode, that's when I knew it was time to jump ship for good.

Honestly, I just never clicked with Bo Nui's character. She felt immensely flat, and in ten episodes, the character really only displayed one of two emotions in nearly every scene: blandly pleasant or heartbroken and crying.

Now, before anyone tries to chalk this up to a case of oppa favoritism (as I've seen some very defensive commenters doing around the general K-bloggosphere), let's be clear: I would definitely chalk it up to writing issues far more than acting issues. While Hwang Jung Eum has a tendency to overact in other shows, she was pretty restrained here—the writing just gave her very little to do. In contrast, it's not really that hard to see why viewers gravitated towards Ryu Joon Yul's character when the writer gave him all of the goofy, endearing character development. Granted, it was also pretty clear that Ryu Joon Yul not only acted the part as it was written, but went above and beyond to make the most of it, and for that he deserves credit.

Other observations I'm too lazy to actually discuss in detail:

Why were Lee Chung Ah and Lee Soo Hyuk even in this show? Did they lose a bet?
Did the fortune teller warn Bo Nui that there would be a terrible denim famine? That's literally the only reason I can think of for her attire. That, or the heir to Korea's biggest denim manufacturer funded this entire drama.
Dal Nim! That's all.
New Korean vocab word learned: tiger. It's like the time I learned how to say "Magistrate" thanks to all the times Arang yelled it.
Yay for a female lead who's also a smart programmer! Too bad I would have fired her immediately if I saw her spending the entire first day asking her male coworkers personal questions.

Where to watch Lucky Romance:

In other words...

There's some good stuff in both of these shows, but not quite enough to outweigh the disappointments. What did you think of these shows? Do you think they lived up to their potential?

Another Oh Hae Young and Lucky Romance Korean Drama Reviews

Saturday, 4 June 2016

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Lucky Romance was the drama I was waiting for all spring. When drama after drama failed to catch my interest, I kept thinking "At least there will be Lucky Romance!" Quirky plot, Ryu Joon Yul soothing my broken post-Answer Me 1988 heart—what more could I possibly want?

As it turns out, a lot. Sigh.

What It's About: Shim Bo Nui (Hwang Jung Eum) is convinced that she leads an unlucky existence. In order to bring more luck to the life of a loved one, a shaman tells her she must sleep with a man born in the year of the tiger. Enter Je Soo Ho, a smartypants game designer who just so happens to be born in the year of the tiger.

Episodes watched: 4

First Impressions: I know I already said this, but sigh. I wanted to like this show so badly, and I just...don't. It's not that there's anything actively bad about it. There isn't anything particularly good about it, either.

It's an MBC romcom that feels like it copied and pasted the scripts of the last five MBC romcoms to make a dull, unimaginative Frankendrama. Every single scene and character feels like it was pulled from another series, making it difficult to connect with the characters and leaving me wondering if tvN might have been a better fit for the premise.

Take Bo Nui's storyline, for example. It's bad enough that the drama opens with her literally wearing a Cinderella-esque kerchief over her hair as she washes floors, just in case we didn't catch the message that this is yet another poor, hardworking heroine. (To be fair, it turns out that she's a genius computer programmer, which is cool, but she's still the epitome of the Candy character in more ways than I care to count.)

Juuuuuust whistle while you work...

Oh yeah, and she's also the most nurturing human on the planet, so when her super creepy new neighbor keeps trying to bust into her apartment, she immediately forgets how creepy he's being the second she spots a tiny cut on his hand. It's almost like I've seen Hwang Jung Eum being a poor hot mess exploding with mothering instincts somewhere before....(In case you don't catch the drift, it was She Was Pretty. Remember how she clipped her boyfriend's nails for him, just like his mommy used to do?)

Then, of course, we also have Mr. Richey McGrumpygenius, who is so rich that he can win a bunch of money and not even care, and so grumpy that he can't give more than mono-syllabic responses to anyone. And a math genius, of course, because falling in love with a regular billionaire is so passe in Korea these days.

Sure, the setup is a cliche, but it's not like I don't watch and enjoy other dramas that follow traditional drama setups. What makes this series so disappointing is that it never quite moves past the lazy premise to give us anything to set this series apart. Where Another Oh Hae Young, for example, excels in making its characters feel real with troubles that strike you in the heart with their familiarity, this drama (at least so far) relies on external plot devices to try to get us to care. Everyone—and I mean EVERYONE—has a sad backstory. It's like the one-upmanship of pain. Oh yeah, your dad may or may not have abandoned you as a child? Well, I apparently killed my parents and almost killed my sister with my terrible fate!

Don't forget to feel sad for me! I'm too talented at things, and I don't know how to swim!

That's a lot of words to say this show is boring. I'm just so disappointed in what could have been. They had a solid cast and source material that sounded funny and sexy—so why is it so unfunny and unsexy so far? It's a shame, but I think this might be a cautionary tale on what happens when the powers that be decide to play it safe.

Where to watch
Viki (Viki Pass only)

New K-Drama Alert: Lucky Romance

Thursday, 5 May 2016

Sooooooo I don't know if you noticed, but we disappeared for a while.

(This is where you nod empathetically like "Oh yes, I totally noticed that this random K-drama blog that only blogged intermittently anyway started blogging even more intermittently." Just humor me, okay?)

In a nutshell, my life exploded (in the best possible way), and then Coco's life also exploded.

Between suddenly switching jobs, adding 3 hours/day to my commute, spending my free time spackling stuff and washing baseboards so that I can sell my house and NOT spend 3 hours/day commuting, and trying not to panic about where we're going to live when our house actually does sell, something had to go—and that something was blogging. And showering. But mostly blogging.

To be honest, I kind of took a breather from all dramas for a while. There weren't many shows that I was dying to watch over the last few months, and I had been living and breathing dramas for so long that when everything else in my life suddenly went into flux, I kind of needed a palate cleanser in my entertainment as well. I made halfhearted attempts to start a few shows, but nothing really captured my attention.

(For the record, Entertainer was the worst. I want those two hours of my life back! Do you know how much grout I could have scrubbed in that time? SO MUCH GROUT! ...Aaaaaand this is how you know you've officially gone crazy. You count your hours in Grout Standard Time.)

The point of this very long exposition is this: I did manage to finish one show in the last three months, and that show is Marriage Contract. Here's why:

The Good

What it's about: Marriage Contract is about young single mother Kang Hye Soo (UEE), who finds out she has terminal brain cancer and agrees to marry rich heir Han Ji Hoon (Lee Seo Jin) and give him her liver in exchange for boatloads of cash.

For the record, this plot is the kind of thing I generally avoid like the plague. It sounded like the most ridiculous K-drama melo clichefest of all time, and the plot didn't really have any massive surprises that deviated from that expectation.

Just look at this poster.
It screams "We're rich and soon to be sad," my two least favorite K-drama cliches.
Image source

So how, of all things, did this end up being the only drama I watched to the end? The answer rests on the cast, but primarily UEE.

Lee Seo Jin is incredibly charming, and he had many moments where I just wanted to pat him on the head and squish his dimpled cheeks, but this was UEE's show, and there aren't enough words to state how much she blew me away in this role.

I always thought UEE was good for an idol actress, but no. In this role, she was phenomenal as an actress. Period. Her portrayal of Kang Hye Soo was vulnerable, strong, and completely heartbreaking all at once. Above all else, Kang Hye Soo felt like an actual human, not some plucky-but-downtrodden K-drama heroine-bot.

I'm not crying—YOU'RE crying!
....Fine, I'm bawling my eyes out.

As I said above, Lee Seo Jin wasn't exactly a slouch either. Before the drama aired, there was a lot of discussion about whether or not these two could pull of believable chemistry in spite of their 17-year age gap. It's something that initially concerned me about the casting, but once the show began, it didn't even cross my mind.

Aside from the central couple, I also really, really, really loved Eun Sung, Kang Hye Soo's daughter. Most television shows and movies, both Korean and Western, tend to include oddly precocious children. It's like no one knows how actual kids act, so they just write adult characters, shove them into tiny child bodies, and pretend it's cute.

What I love about Eun Sung as a character is that she acts like a 7-year-old girl. I read some initial complaints about how people thought Eun Sung was "bratty" or "annoying," but I have to wonder if those people ever spent any time around actual 7-year-old girls. Even if you believe your kid is the most well-behaved angel on the planet, I'm sorry to tell you that ALL kids throw tantrums sometimes. Then take into consideration that Eun Sung only really acts out in response to stressful life situations, and you can't really blame her.

Dear TV writers: This is what a child looks like.
You might be confused because she isn't spouting off words from the dictionary or talking about fossil fuels.

I love how genuinely playful Eun Sung is, and I also love how both Hye Soo and Ji Hoon embrace her childhood. They talk at her level without being patronizing and encourage her to be a kid, playing along with her games. They don't let her run wild, but they also respect who she is as a person, even if it's only a 7-year-old person.

The Quibbles

First of all, episodes 1–4 were an honest snoozefest. I'm glad I continued, but if the beginning doesn't compel you, keep going.

Second, most of the side characters, even our second leads, were pretty unnecessary. We got some emotion from Ji Hoon's mom and I loved Hye Soo's supportive bestie, but for the most part, all of the secondary stories felt empty. Does anyone really feel like they were super invested in what happened to Hye Soo's childhood admirer or Ji Hoon's harp-playing ex? (You can say yes, but you'll be lying.) What about all the rest of Ji Hoon's family and their cartoonish villainous antics? So boring. I can abide villains, but I have to draw the line at boring villains.

The last quibble—and this is a big one—is that episodes 10-13 tanked Ji Hoon's character and nearly made me stop watching the entire drama. When a woman says "You're making me uncomfortable. Please stop contacting me, or I'll call the police," it is UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES OKAY to keep following her. When a drama takes a woman clearly expressing her discomfort and then frames it to say that she's just hiding her true feelings and true love means never giving up, no matter how many times she says no, that's the very definition of rape culture. I don't care if she kissed you one time and now you've gotten it into your head that she secretly loves you. If she says no, that means leave her alone, and any drama that says otherwise deserves a swift kick in the family jewels.

AHSDIFHSOIDHFOIWHEGUHBRGSDJFBSLJ SO ANGRY!

I'm really angry about episodes 10-13 Ji Hoon, but it all felt so out of place that I'm just going to assume the writer went on a cocaine bender for a week and snapped out of it after while.

But What about the Ending? (Spoiler-free)

I don't want to ruin it, but I will say that this genre of drama usually ends in one of two ways: either they milk the tears and make it feel emotionally manipulative, or they end with a magical reversal of fate that feels unrealistic and cheap.

Heading into the finale, I had no idea which way Marriage Contract would go. Somehow, it managed to strike a balance between the two, giving viewers an ending that was satisfying without being overly saccharine.

Conclusions

The plot may not be fresh, and it's certainly not without its flaws, but incredibly compelling acting and a warmhearted story elevate Marriage Contract above most dramas of its genre.

Where to watch Marriage Contract

And We're Back! Marriage Contract Korean Drama Review

Wednesday, 3 February 2016

Am I the only one who feels like I'm suddenly drowning in new drama options? Holy smokes! There I was, minding my own business with my new BFF Cheese in the Trap, and suddenly BAM! Four new dramas premiered within one week!

Realistically, there's no way I'm watching more than two dramas at once with maaaaaaybe a third one on the backburner for days when I'm bored, but I did my best to give at least 3/4 shows a fair shot. (Sorry, Neighborhood Hero. Better luck next time!) Writing about that many shows at once is overwhelming, so I'm limiting myself to 3-sentence first impressions—and not James Joyce Ulysses style sentences, either. Let's get to it.

1. One More Happy Ending

What it's about: Former girl group member Han Mi Mo (Jang Nara) runs a successful matchmaking service for divorced men and women as she tries to find her own second chance at love. Song Soo Hyuk (Jung Kyung Ho) is a tabloid reporter and single dad who finds his path crossing with Mi Mo.

Episodes watched: 4

First impressions: The first episode was sexy and fun, and I suddenly discovered that Jung Kyung Ho has a crazy magnetism about him that I can't quite pinpoint. Unfortunately, the romance quickly devolved into yet another humdrum K-drama love triangle of people who magically knew each other as children. If I keep watching, it will be for the core group of girl friends, whose individual stories are far more nuanced and interesting than Mi Mo's sudden crush on her ER doctor.

2. Madame Antoine

What it's about: Choi Soo Hyun (Sung Joon), a supposed psychology genius, gets thrown together with psychic Go Hye Rim (Han Ye Seul), who claims to speak to the spirit of Marie Antoinette. After she becomes his employee, he decides to run the least scientifically sound, most unethical experiment in the world by having all three men who work at the office try to win her affections.

Episodes watched: 3

First impressions: Ummm, I hate to break it to you, Mr. Stanford PhD, but no peer reviewed journal is going to accept a "study" about you trying to get into your assistant's pants (or designer skirt, as the case may be). Sometimes dramas can get away with a nonsense premise if the lead couple has enough chemistry (Sensory Couple and Oh My Venus come to mind), but considering how often I want to punch Soo Hyun in the face, I'm not exactly tripping over myself to watch the romance. This feels like a sinking ship, and I'm jumping out while I can.

3. Signal

What it's about: Profiler Park Hae Young (Lee Je Hoon) discovers a two-way radio that mysteriously allows him to communicate with a detective from the past (Jo Jin Woong). Together with the help of lead detective Cha Soo Hyun (Kim Hye Soo), they work to solve some of the nation's largest cold cases.

Episodes watched: 2:

First impressions: Is it appropriate to use a cat with heart eyes emoji for a show about serial killers. Stop watching whichever nonsense romcom you halfheartedly decided to start this week and watch Signal instead. If the rest of the series maintains even a fraction of the writing, directing, and acting trifecta we got in week 1, it will be well worth the watch.

Which new shows are you watching? Are you as bored with the romcoms as I am? Are you as in love with Signal as I am? (If not, is it because you haven't started yet? Because you should probably take care of that.)

New K-drama Alert: One More Happy Ending, Madame Antoine, and Signal

Sunday, 24 January 2016

I have composed this review in my head approximately 11,454,697,239 times, and it still feels like a mammoth undertaking. Maybe it's because Answer Me 1988 was 20 episodes that each ranged from an hour and a half to two hours each. There's so much content to cover that I don't really feel like I can talk about all of it This is why I don't watch long dramas, people!

So, instead of being a responsible blogger and talking about each and every aspect of this show, I'm going to do what I want, which is to rush through the majority of the show so that I can get on my soapbox and vent my very intense feelings about how this series ended. At least I'm giving fair warning, right?

On the whole, Answer Me 1988 was a beautiful, nostalgic, slice-of-life show. While I admit that the production team could have edited some of the scenes more efficiently (less isn't always more), I mostly didn't mind the narrative's leisurely pace or the focus on the mundane.

Instead of the absurd amnesia plot devices, what really drove this series was its heart. Yes, there was a love triangle (and oh boy, I'll get to that in a minute), but really, this series was more about the individual trials of every member of the neighborhood than it was about the puppy love blossoming with the three "main" leads.

I love how, more than any other Answer Me installment, this series was about community, and the adults all had their own lives and trajectories. I often had a hard time choosing a favorite character or storyline. (Cheetah Ahjumma vs. the Bear falling in love? Don't make me choose!) The neighborhood came to life, and the way I resonated with the various narrative threads really made me feel invested in the series.

Before the drama began, the writer said that there would be no "husband hunt" this time around, and, if that had been the case, this series would have been practically perfect in every way.

That initial promise ended up being a dirty, dirty lie, and I feel far more trolled than I ever did in the previous Answer Me shows. While the love triangle certainly wasn't front and center for most of the series, the way it was woven into the last few episodes of the drama really made it impossible to ignore and—for me, at least—ended the drama on a bit of a sour note.

SPOILER ALERT—HERE BEGINS VIVI'S ANGRY SOAPBOX, IN WHICH I DISCUSS THE OUTCOME OF THE SERIES. ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK.

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Is it safe to begin?

To be perfectly candid before my rant, I was pretty solidly Team Jung Hwan from episode 1, so I was obviously going to be a little disappointed if Taek was the husband. However, I said from the very early episodes that all of the guys had their pros and cons as potential spouse material, so I could have been okay with any outcome.

I'm still not entirely convinced that Dong Ryong isn't Deok Sun's true soulmate, but that's a discussion for another day....

When I saw the last few episodes of the series, I liked the sweet moments between Deok Sun and Taek, and I loved seeing how tender their relationship is as adults (or the episodes 18-20 version of them, at least). I was completely convinced that they ended up as a perfectly content couple, and I could even see why Deok Sun would choose Taek (something that doesn't always happen when I'm rooting for the guy the female lead doesn't choose). It's also refreshing to see the second male lead type win out every once in a while, and I've seen several dramas where a twist in the endgame romance worked immensely well.

So far, all of these are good things — why, then, was this one of the least-satisfying drama endings I've seen? Frankly, my complaints aren't about the outcome of the romance so much as the handling of the romance. To be honest, it felt as though the writer sold out her narrative for the sake of ratings.

I'm sorry—somehow I missed the part where I signed up to watch Sherlock Holmes: '80s Romance Edition

I guess whether or not the last few episodes are satisfying depends on what you enjoy out of a romance. If you're only in it for the surprise, then this drama is probably fantastic, but I, at least, watch romances not to see who gets together, but rather to enjoy seeing how they fall in love. In this series, the writer kept Deok Sun's feelings hidden for so long in order to preserve the mystery that we really didn't get to see much romantic development on her side until the very end of the show.

Similarly, while I get that "future husband" dropped equal clues for Taek and Jung Hwan (though it seems odd that she married Taek only for him to grow up and act like Jung Hwan), the narrative structure itself favored Jung Hwan because it showed us so much romantic development from his perspective.

The perfect example here is the concert in episode 18. This was a pivotal moment not only in Jung Hwan's feelings, but also in Deok Sun and Taek's relationship. But whose perspective do we see? The emotional focus of the scene is on Jung Hwan and his race to declare his feelings.

If Deok Sun/Taek is the romance we should be watching, the scene would have felt much more satisfying if we saw it from Taek's perspective as he leaves the match and races to her (and then we could see Jung Hwan's perspective in a flashback or something). Alternately, we could have seen everything from Deok Sun's view, where we feel her rising disappointment building up until we see her relief at seeing Taek.

What kind of monster wouldn't be happy to see this face?
The kind of monster that just watched Jung Hwan stuck at every freaking red light in Seoul, that's who.
(Sidenote: Park Bo Gum's gigantic smile makes me feel like I'm playing with unicorns in a field full of flowers.)

When scene after scene focuses on the love triangle from Jung Hwan's lens, of course it's going to feel like a massive letdown when his romance putters out with one of the most beautiful confessions in K-drama history, only to have it turn into a joke that never gets mentioned again. We also distance the audience from Deok Sun and Taek's relationship in order to preserve the mystery, thereby doing all three characters a disservice.

I don't even cry when people die in K-dramas, but I swear Jung Hwan's earnest face makes me feel like a tractor is driving over my heart.
I'm not crying—I just have very dirty eyeballs that need to get clean!

While I would have preferred that Jung Hwan and Taek just talk it out back in 1989, I could have settled for more clear resolution after Jung Hwan's confession. Did you notice that after the confession, Deok Sun and Jung Hwan never make eye contact again for the remaining two episodes (four hours) of the series? Would it have killed them to have a little more closure after six years of one-sided love?

All I wanted was a clear indication that Deok Sun was choosing Taek over Jung Hwan. Some sort of recognition that she knew his confession was sincere would have sufficed. Instead, we get that scene between Jung Hwan and Taek where he's basically saying, "No, no no, good sir, you take her," which makes all this waiting for Deok Sun's feelings seem like a moot point. Sure, she chose Taek, but she also didn't have any other options.

I wanted to see Deok Sun falling for Taek, understand how she felt during their years of separation, watch them announce their relationship to their friends and family, etc., but hanging on to the husband mystery undermined all of that.

I read some fan comments basically arguing that it's Jung Hwan's own fault for being too passive and letting Deok Sun get away, but that makes Deok Sun way too passive for me. So she's only there to be passed around by the male characters? If she's really an active agent in all of this, why not let her know everyone's feelings out in the open so that she can make her own choice? If the only thing keeping Deok Sun and Taek apart was Jung Hwan's passiveness, you clearly didn't have a convincing romance in the first place.

Then, to add salt to the wound, we completely drop Jung Hwan off the face of the planet for the end of the series. Not only does he have zero one-on-one interaction with Deok Sun, but he has a grand total of maybe three minutes of screentime in the entire last episode. Every other Answer Me series gave us glimpses into the future for the entire friend group, but both Jung Hwan and Dong Ryong get ditched in the end. I didn't need to see them getting married, but it's like they didn't even exist.

Again, I read some fan explanations saying that it's natural that Deok Sun and Taek would lose contact with their old friends over time. I've also read people arguing that the romance wasn't the point of the show, so we shouldn't get hung up on the romantic outcome.

Unfortunately, neither gives a satisfactory explanation for the omission. If the series wasn't focused on the romance, then why are the romantic couples suddenly the only ones who matter at the end of the show? It shouldn't make a difference if Deok Sun hangs out with Jung Hwan or not because she wasn't the only main character to begin with. Remember how we totally ignored her POV for five episodes so that you could string our emotions along? Yeah, you can't take that back now. Give me my Dong Ryong! Give me My Jung Hwan! GIVE ME JIN JOO OR GIVE ME DEATH! (Too much? Fiiiine, I'll tone it down.)

How DARE you ignore this face?

Part of me suspects that the writer was worried that keeping Ryu Joon Yeol and his insane on-screen charisma around would be a distraction from the Deok Sun/Taek story, but maybe not. Maybe the writer genuinely believed that the romance was all that mattered all along, and it was the rest of us who were fooled into thinking we were watching a community narrative instead of Deok Sun's Husband Hunt.

Ultimately, I can't help but feel that the writing hurt both the characters and the plot development. The only benefit to some of the narrative choices was keeping people glued to their screens, and that's exactly what happened. With the record-busting ratings for this show, the writer got her reward—at the expense of the ending.

Conclusions

Does a bad ending ruin the show? For this series, I would argue no. The conclusion certainly left me feeling upset and cheated, but there were also so many beautiful community moments woven throughout the drama, including in the last few episodes, that I don't think you can write off the series for the romance.

Where to watch: